Good News & Bad News: Prelude to the sequel "F@*k You, Do Better"

Good News: I know the meaning of life. Bad News: So do you.

Between the people shouting one particular number at this book and the people just shouting, in general, I would like to take this moment to address a few people that are shouting something I personally find interesting. "Finally a different chapter title!" You, group of readers, you are some of my favorite. Either you're reading this book fully engaged in the fluidity of the topics or you're a critic that truly hates the book. Many people find it in poor taste to claim you know the meaning of life as it is a philosophical topic. Many have spent their entire lives thinking about it and never finding it. It is in even poorer taste to claim that the general public is also aware of the mean of life and furthermore claiming this is bad news. I enjoy philosophy myself and can understand the sentiment. However, I would like to take this chapter to explain, while even in poor taste, it is true that you and I understand the meaning of life and why in some people's perspective it would be bad news.

What is the meaning of life? A question many have asked and many have in their own way, answered. Depending on the person you ask, they will likely answer this question by explaining that they do not know, or quote a particular philosopher who had taken up the challenge of answering the question. So a better question is, who is right in their answer? As it stands not knowing is still an answer to the question. 

If I asked you what the color of your blood is, as it runs through your lungs to get oxygen, you would answer either red or blue. Red is the color of blood when oxygen has interacted with it. Blue is the color, we have been told, blood is if there is a lack of oxygen. So who is right in their answer. One might say both are right. I say it doesn't matter as we can never really tell. If you were to try and document the color of blood without oxygen you would need to remove the oxygen from the environment and then from the blood and hope that you were successful in doing so. At that point in time, you may be able to see the color of blood with the lack of oxygen but still not know which answer is right. The body is never devoid of oxygen. It's not a closed environment. There is no part of you that's a vacuum, as there are far too many openings for there to be no trace of oxygen in your body. The experiment would then be a theoretical answer to the question. Philosophy is just that, theoretical answers to questions that are not straightforward. Therefore, any philosophical answer to the question would be just as valid as not knowing the answer at all. The validity being the answer to the question or moreover, part of the answer, as the question has been simplified.

If you have ever taken calculus and had a good math teacher, one of the things they may have taught you is that calculus is just as simple as algebra. As long as you know what to do and remember the basics, any calculus question can be broken apart into smaller algebra questions and solved. Art is much the same way. Technique is a basic understanding of how to produce different kinds of art. Once you have the basics down the more complex stuff can be broken down into parts and solved. What is the meaning of life, is the calculus question. In order to solve it, let's get back to basic algebra. Let's take the question in parts. First, we'll look at the words used in the question. Then we'll dive into the concept of the question and finally show why you already know the answer.

What is the meaning of life? Let's take a second to look at the words in the question. We'll start at the end and work our way through the whole thing. Life has been defined in many different ways. Some would say, if you are carbon based on structure and find means of self-sustaining through your environment, you are alive. This means plants are just as alive as people, animals and any other form of life beyond the boundaries of the earth. Others would say that life has a much deeper mean as it includes emotions thoughts and feelings. This would limit the definition of animals and people. We have no way of confirming if there is life beyond our planet that has thoughts and emotions as well so well ignore that variable.

Meaning is subjective in nature. What one thing means to you can be something entirely different to someone else. In order to simplify the mean, we have to understand where it comes from exactly in regards to life events. We will skip over analyzing meaning like that of a pair of glasses on a chair. It's not relevant to go through the intense history of art just to realize you been staring at someones forgotten glasses in an art hall.